The case is cooled by 2 x 120mm 800 rpm fans pulling air in from the front and the cpu is cooled by the Antec H920 Water cooling system with the standard fans replaced to some silenx pro 120mm fans with high air throughput. Thermal compound is arctic mx4.

Room temp is arround 22C

I think this setup should give me quite good cooling, but still my CPU runs at 76 C when tested with AIDA64 at 100 % load for 20 min.

My idle temps are 30C on cores 0,1 and 3 while its 38C on core 2.

Full load core temps are arround 70 to 76C, but always core 2 as hottest one.

When reading other posts on different forums my cooling solution should give me atleast below 60 and for some people even below 50 in full load.

I have reinstalled the CPU 3 times now, once i also tryed the new box cooler with the thermal paste that was already applyed to it in the box, and that gave me load temps of 89C. I am perfectly sure that the coolers both were installed correctly and that the thermal compound was applyed as i should be ( I could see each time i removed it that it was spread evenly on the IHS of the CPU and covered it.

Should i be concerned at those temps ? Do i have a bad chip that i should replace ? How come some people with almost the same setup as me get temps that are 20C lower then me running the CPU at the same spped as i do ?

I spend extra money on this 3770K version of the cpu hoping for some Overclocking, but with my temps i dont think i should.

Please intel let me know your commends

1. Can there be big difference between the chips of the same CPU model, so that some run up to 20C cooler then others under full load and same conditions or is this caused by my chip being bad and i should return it for another one ?

2. What else could i try to get lower temp or trouble shoot why my temps are so high. I know fore example that the liquid in the Antec H920 is 40C when the cores on the cpu are at 76C. Can that be used to tell if i loose too much heat between the heatsink of the water cooler and the CPU ?

Hope to get some suggestions on whether i have bad CPU or if there is something else i could try to do with my setup.

There are many things to check before even thinking that the CPU is bad. I use an i5-3570K CPU on an ASRock Z77 Ex4 board, with a Corsair H60 CPU cooler, and given my experience with that, I would say this:

Ivy Bridge (IB) CPUs generally run warmer than Sandy Bridge CPUs, and are more difficult to cool. You can only compare temperatures with the same CPU as yours, with the same settings and CPU cooler. If not, the comparison is not valid.

I find it very, very hard to believe anyone is achieving full load CPU temperatures below 60C with your CPU with anything but a completely custom liquid cooling solution that costs as much as the CPU. Given what I have seen in reviews of IB CPUs, none of the all in one liquid cooling systems will keep a i7-3770K below 70C at full load. The temperatures you reported for your CPU are great for that CPU, IMO. My i5-3570K idle temperature is never below 30C, and that is with SpeedStep enabled, with the cores usually running at 1.6GHz. When testing it at full load with an OC of only 4.2GHz, it reaches 75C in under 10 seconds, and hits 80C at least.

IMO, Silenx fans are not exceptional, and most of them are poor. The best one for cooling is their 120mm x 38mm model.

The fan control software on ASRock boards is very simple and IMO the worst I've ever used. Are you using PWM fans (four pin) or three pin fans? Are you using AXTU and the UEFI settings for the fan speed control? What settings do you use? The default setting in the UEFI for the CPU fan is Full On, which means it does not change with temperature.

Frankly, I do not believe anyone using your CPU and CPU cooler in a house at 22C can get a full load CPU temperature below ~70C. 60C or less with your CPU and cooler at full load is impossible, IMO. Search for some reviews of your CPU on the Internet, and check the temperatures found during testing.

I thin k your right. Did some more reading at i think MY CPU is OK, not the best chip but ok.

I have made at change to my case and made a hole in the top of it where i installed a corsair 140,, silent fan. Its pulling air in just above ram and cpu and this gets exhausted my the 2 Silenx 120 mounted in a push/pull setup on the Antec H920 radiator at the rear of the case.

Did this to get more cold air for the radiator fans to cool the radiator.

It gave me a few degrees, so now im on 28 - 32 idle ( core 2 is 32 while rest is 27 and 28 ). Full load is now at 65-69 C

Trying some OC now and at 4.0 i reached 76C, at 4.2 i reached 82 but got some erros in aida after 21 mins and second time after 7 mins.

Trying a 4.4 Overclock now and running at 87 C for the highest core value, stable so far for 28 min. I put the Core Voltage to -0.040v compared to the auto setting. Its running at 100 MHz x 44 multiplyer and with 1.232 v ( minus 0.40 ) = 1.192 V. without lowering the core voltage i reached 92 C.

I might try lowering the Vcore a bit more. If i can get below 85 C i think its ok because thats even better then at stock speed with stock cooler, and then im still 20C below the max which i read should be 105 ?

I've used the Corsair all in one liquid coolers for a while now, on several PCs, and IMO the best way to set up any liquid cooler like these is like this:

Use air from outside the PC case to cool the radiator. That means to set up the radiator fans to pull air in from the top-rear fan intake. That is called "intake mode", using air from outside of the PC case, instead of using the air inside the PC case to cool the radiator, which is "exhaust mode". You are using exhaust mode now, given your description.The air inside the PC case will usually if not always be warmer than the air outside the PC case. If you use a hot running video card (or more than one) the air inside the case will always be warmer than the air outside the case. Add to that all the other parts in the PC creating heat, which will surely make the air inside the case warmer than the air outside the case. That will limit the cooling ability of any CPU cooler.

Next, when using intake mode, you need to get the warm air from the radiator out of the case. Exhaust fans on the top of the case are essential to do this, and as long as the main air exhaust of the PC case is at the top, it will work great. You said you added a fan to pull air in on the top, to feed air to your CPU cooler, but I really think you should try it as I have described, and use the fan on the top as an exhaust for the CPU cooler running in intake mode.

If you are not using the onboard graphics of your CPU (which I doubt you are), you can try the following, which I have done. In your UEFI/BIOS, see if you can lower the voltage provided to the graphics core of your CPU. Even if it is not being used, it still receives power. But, be careful if you try this, since it can cause the PC to BSOD or not boot! On my Z77 board, when I directly reduced the graphics core voltage, the PC would not boot. I could set the offset voltage to the graphics core manually, set to minus instead of plus, and set the offset voltage as low as I could. That did not cause a BSOD or boot problem. Your board may have different settings for the graphics core voltage that you could try, which might cool the CPU off a bit more. Your board might react differently than mine does, so be careful and just go back to default settings for the graphics core if it does not work.

The IB CPU die and cores are smaller than earlier CPUs, and has become more of a challenge to cool. The CPU temperature when throttling is activated is higher than ever, as you said. IMO, it is safe to OC IB CPUs, since you won't be using them at 100% usage except with stress testing programs. They may not be able to OC as well as Sandy Bridge CPUs, but they make up for that by being a bit faster.

Hey parsec I found this because I was looking for info on my full load temps with Prime95, and well I'm glad to stumble accross it. I have the ASRock Extreme4 motherboard and while it's ok I too found the fan control software to be mostly useless. They have different levels for some connections, then temperature controls for others, but no consistency or logic to it. I found it very difficult to make use of honestly so you are totally right there. As for this post I don't understand what you are getting honestly, I have a Hyper 212 Evo and a Enermax Magma fan on it at around 1200 rpms very quiet and get 63C full loads nowhere near 70+. This isn't even water cooling we're talking about so it's weird.